Yesterday, the importance of cohesive business culture slapped me directly across the face.
After doing some work at la Brazen Careerist centrale, I drove to a local copy shop to make some cards for my bosses’ booth at ERE next week. The task was simple: create 50 cards on heavy weight paper. Or so I thought.
At first, I walked into the copy center and walked up to the customer service desk and asked how to create copies of an image onto heavy weight paper. Employee #1′s response:
“We cannot print multiple images. If you create a PDF of the multiple images, we make the copies behind the counter. Walk to the computer station and use its software.”
So I walked over to the computer and tried to put the image on a sheet multiple times. The customer service representative failed to tell me that the computer lacked a PDF distiller or Microsoft Office plugin to create a PDF, so I had to search online for a tool that would let me do this. I finally (after 5 minutes) found a Web site that would let me turn an Word document into a PDF without downloading software.
I logged off and went back to the front counter. This time, a different employee spoke with me when I handed her my red Wisconsin USB drive. Employee #2′s response:
“If you want to place an order to make copies behind the desk, it will take at least two hours to process the copies.”
Huh? Didn’t your co-worker just tell me that I could give her the USB drive and she would whip out a batch of copies on heavy weight paper for me?
“My suggestion,” Employee #2 said,” is to make a color printout of your document and then go to one of the color copy machines. They can take heavy weight paper and it will be much cheaper/time efficient that having us do an order behind the desk.”
Thanks for telling me that I could do a heavyweight copy at a regular copy machine!
So, I went back to the computer station, only to find that all of the computers were being used. I had to wait another 10 minutes before a station opened up. Killing another 3 minutes on the computer, I printed off the sheet of images from the overpriced color laser printer.
I walked up to the color copy machine. Oh crap- I buy a few sheets of heavyweight paper. Once again, I walk up to the front counter. This time, an older woman talks with me. I ask if I can purchase some heavyweight paper. Employee #3′s response:
“What do you want me to do?” (I had to explain what I needed AGAIN) “Oh, I can just do that behind the desk for you. You don’t need to do it on a copy machine.”
At this point, I was starting to get cranky. Why didn’t Employee #1 tell me this ?
I was getting cranky...
If you think that all went smoothly after talking with Employee #3, you’re wrong. Employee #3 could not get her copy machine to work. For about 3 runs, she could get the machine to spit out one copy before paper jammed inside the machine. Awkwardly standing at the desk for another 10 minutes, I heard employee #3 swear to herself and grumble about this project.
She then walked back to me and said:
“Well, that machine is not working. I could only get 3 copies. If you want, I do the rest of the sheets on one of the main floor’s copy machines.”
Obviously I said yes. We walked over to the copy machine and I handed her my boss’s company credit card. With my luck, the card didn’t register so I had to use my emergency credit card (side note for the parents: I’ll write a check when I am home for Spring Break. Brazen Careerist is reimbursing me) to charge the project. Another 5 minutes went by as Employee #3 tried to set up the machine. Finally, she got it to work and the papers started rolling out. She made another comment to me:
“This machine is probably going to read the paper as 11 X 17, so I’m going to have to edit your card balance at the front desk.”
Fine. If you change the bill and get me out of this copy shop, I’ll be happy.
The prints finished and we went back to the front desk. Yada Yada Yada… I was done with the transaction and went to the cutting station because, according to Employee #1, it cost $1.50 for each cut if I wanted them to slice the cards. When I walked to the cutting station, I realized that the slicing machine would not accept my paper because it was heavyweight instead of the regular stock size.
As I looked down at the paper, I saw smudges. Were my hands dirty? No. I realized that the toner on one of the pages completely smeared off.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
I walked back to Employee #3 and told her the situation. She rolled her eyes at me but told me that it wasn’t my fault. Employee #3 went back to her faulty machine behind the front desk and attempted to make another copy for me… until Employee #1 walked up to her and said in a snarky tone :
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING? I’ve got a order running right now, so you cannot use this machine until it’s done.”
Employee #3 walked back to me and said that the machine was down, so there was nothing she could do at the moment.
I was pissed off at this moment. I saw her talking with Employee #1 five feet in front of me. She flat out lied to me and failed to explain that another project was running at the moment.
Being the most rational person in the copy shop, I asked if I could get a piece of heavy stock paper. I decided to attempt printing the last page at our office or go back to my apartment and use my inkjet printer to finish the project. Employee #3 gave me the sheet and told me good luck.
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What I learned from this experience was that a company needs to have all employees on the same page in terms of procedures and values. If Employee #1 knew the same information as Employee #3, I would have cut 20 minutes from my experience at the copy shop and not walking out of the store being a dissatisfied customer.
It’s ironic that this situation occurred because the experience parallels what I am learning in my management and human resources class. According to the class materials, strong management plus clear directions and the value of customer service would help the copy center employees fulfill their company’s mission. Instead, the employees yelled at each other, seemed to be stressed out, and didn’t deliver quality service to the customer.
Although I was irritated at the copy center, I connected the materials from my college course to the real world- something pretty interesting. Now if I could only start my take-home midterm for the class instead of blogging… 
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Image source: http://www.division21.com/images/kinkos-inside1.jpg